The Barbarism of Berlin | Page 8

cannot be defended is something really peculiar to Prussia, of
which we hear numberless stories, some of them certainly true. It might
be called the one-sided duel. I mean the idea that there is some sort of
dignity in drawing the sword upon a man who has not got a sword; a
waiter, or a shop assistant, or even a schoolboy. One of the officers of
the Kaiser in the affair at Saberne was found industriously hacking at a
cripple. In all these matters I would avoid sentiment. We must not lose
our tempers at the mere cruelty of the thing; but pursue the strict
psychological distinction. Others besides German soldiers have slain
the defenceless, for loot or lust or private malice, like any other
murderer. The point is that nowhere else but in Prussian Germany is
any theory of honour mixed up with such things; any more than with
poisoning or picking pockets. No French, English, Italian or American
gentleman would think he had in some way cleared his own character
by sticking his sabre through some ridiculous greengrocer who had
nothing in his hand but a cucumber. It would seem as if the word which
is translated from the German as "honour," must really mean something
quite different in German. It seems to mean something more like what
we should call "prestige."
The fundamental fact, however, is the absence of the reciprocal idea.
The Prussian is not sufficiently civilised for the duel. Even when he
crosses swords with us his thoughts are not as our thoughts; when we
both glorify war, we are glorifying different things. Our medals are

wrought like his, but they do not mean the same thing; our regiments
are cheered as his are, but the thought in the heart is not the same; the
Iron Cross is on the bosom of his king, but it is not the sign of our God.
For we, alas, follow our God with many relapses and
self-contradictions, but he follows his very consistently. Through all
the things that we have examined, the view of national boundaries, the
view of military methods, the view of personal honour and self-defence,
there runs in their case something of an atrocious simplicity; something
too simple for us to understand: the idea that glory consists in holding
the steel, and not in facing it.
If further examples were necessary, it would be easy to give hundreds
of them. Let us leave, for the moment, the relation between man and
man in the thing called the duel. Let us take the relation between man
and woman, in that immortal duel which we call a marriage. Here again
we shall find that other Christian civilisations aim at some kind of
equality; even if the balance be irrational or dangerous. Thus, the two
extremes of the treatment of women might be represented by what are
called the respectable classes in America and in France. In America
they choose the risk of comradeship; in France the compensation of
courtesy. In America it is practically possible for any young gentleman
to take any young lady for what he calls (I deeply regret to say) a
joyride; but at least the man goes with the woman as much as the
woman with the man. In France the young woman is protected like a
nun while she is unmarried; but when she is a mother she is really a
holy woman; and when she is a grandmother she is a holy terror. By
both extremes the woman gets something back out of life. There is only
one place where she gets little or nothing back; and that is the north of
Germany. France and America aim alike at equality--America by
similarity; France by dissimilarity. But North Germany does definitely
aim at inequality. The woman stands up, with no more irritation than a
butler; the man sits down, with no more embarrassment than a guest.
This is the cool affirmation of inferiority, as in the case of the sabre and
the tradesman. "Thou goest with women; forget not thy whip," said
Nietzsche. It will be observed that he does not say "poker"; which
might come more naturally to the mind of a more common or Christian
wife-beater. But then a poker is a part of domesticity; and might be
used by the wife as well as the husband. In fact, it often, is. The sword

and the whip are the weapons of a privileged caste.
Pass from the closest of all differences, that between husband and wife,
to the most distant of all differences, that of the remote and unrelated
races who have seldom seen each other's faces, and never been tinged
with each other's blood. Here we still find the same unvarying Prussian
principle. Any European might feel a genuine fear of